Eschewing pitch decks and personal connections in favour of data - here's how a European investor uses AI to stay on top

• Swedish investment firm EQT Ventures employs a proprietary AI and big data tool to identify hot startups to invest in as it looks to stay ahead of the pack in Europe.
• The fund's data-driven efforts have seen four of its last 10 investments come through its "Motherbrain" technology.
• EQT says investors which don't become data-driven risk being left behind in the future.
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Investors across all asset classes are are always looking for a cutting edge over the competition but the pace of change has been markedly slower in venture capital than in other sectors.

That may be changing as the industry looks to adopt algorithmic and data-driven investing as standard, with Sweden's EQT Ventures set up deliberately for that purpose.

EQT Ventures is a relatively new fund within the Stockholm-based private equity group EQT which covers traditional sectors in credit, public equities, and infrastructure. One of the firm's cofounders, EQT Ventures partner Lars Jörnow, estimates that four of the fund's last 10 investments have come through Motherbrain, its propriety AI platform.

Motherbrain, referred to as a she with her own email address at the fund, has scanned more than 10 million startups, and is an essential part of the operations of EQT as the VC firm looks to compete with larger funds.

"We're in a competitive situation where founders have the choice of many funds which is hard to quantify so we think long term, 15-20 years from now, if you're not data-driven you won't be around anymore," Jornow told Business Insider in an interview at Web Summit in Lisbon.

The platform is built out of a variety of data sources including website traffic, app store downloads, valuation data, fundraising news, financial data, and investor information alongside other inputs from members of the EQT Ventures team.

Some of the recent investments made through Motherbrain include Amazon Go competitor Standard Cognition, augmented reality gaming studio WarDucks, college student career network Handshake, and remote desktop company AnyDesk.

The example of AnyDesk is cited by Jörnow as proof of Motherbrain's value to the fund. The company, which raised a €6.5 million ($7.8 million) Series A last May, is based in Stuttgart and seemed to have been passed over by Berlin's VC scene but its activity was picked up by Motherbrain, leading to EQT Ventures' investment.

The firm's first investment through Motherbrain was Danish employee data startup Peakon in 2017.

Unsurprisingly, the fund is bullish on Motherbrain's future uses. Jörnow predicts that some 90% of the firms investment decisions will come through Motherbrain in the next five years.

Unicorn hunting and breaking tradition

Motherbrain's applications are breaking the mold in the world of venture capital where personal connections and stereotypes of an "old boys' network" can still apply. However, EQT Venture's operating partner for analytics, Henrik Landgren says that EQT will soon do away with many traditional data sources. "We don't need to see pitch decks, even great ones, or pitches from our close friends because we already have the data on these companies."

The platform would have successfully picked out a number of - undisclosed - unicorns in the market with its current configurations, EQT claimed. Landgren indicated that the fund is constantly adding sources to Motherbrain and that as much time is spent analyzing and learning from existing data sets as looking for new ones.

His data team is now six people out of a total at 15 across the EQT firm which has more than $45 billion in AUM, of which its venture arm is approximately $650 million emphasising its focus on data.

Not everyone is convinced by the move to big data in venture, though. Last year multiple people left Silicon Valley fund Social Capital after it announced a move towards more data-driven decision making.

But the trend is becoming more common. Notably GV (formerly Google Ventures), Correlation Ventures, Fly Ventures, and of course the aforementioned Social Capital pioneered "CaaS" - capital-as-a-service, in imitation of software-as-a-service.

Notably, as big data and analytics transform other market sectors it seems EQT have made this pursuit one of its central pillars across its portfolio. Earlier this year it was reported that the fund would let Motherbrain loose on its buyout fund which could significantly improve deal flow information and report making within the private equity group, per a Bloomberg report.

There is still plenty to iron out. "We haven't even started," Landgren added. "It's a no-brainer that you would use tech to invest in tech companies so we will improve our algorithms. Soon all funds will be talking about using data."